In der schier endlosen Menge an Romantasy- Reihen ist fantasy historical fiction das Regenbogenglitzereinhorn, das man zufällg gefunden hat und allein seiner Einzigartigkeit wegen mögen muss. Das war endlich mal was anderes! Neue story, neue characters, eine Katze… Was will man mehr? Allerdings habe ich das Gefühl, dass man entweder historisch bewandert sein muss, um sich im Italien der Renaissance heimisch zu fühlen oder es gibt da irgendwo ein Prequel, das mir entgangen ist.

The central plot point (Ravenna coming to live with the Luni family and working as a sculptress for them) quickly lost focus, and the family itself never felt fully developed or compelling enough to carry the story. One of my biggest issues was the sheer number of povs. Several of them felt unnecessary and made the book feel more drawn out than it needed to be. Other important characters like the Medici family and the pope had significant influence on the plot, but weren’t included very much. Some of the character‘s choices also didn’t really make sense to me. I did enjoy the romance between Ravenna and Saturnino, and their connection made sense on a surface level, but the tension faded too quickly and the “forbidden” aspect of their relationship was resolved a bit too suddenly for me. I also really wished we’d seen more exploration of Ravenna’s powers, because the magic system was quite interesting and something very important for the story. Overall, this book has beautiful writing and a richly described setting, but it felt overcrowded with too many povs and plotlines that never fully unfolded. I think for the amount of plot and characters Ibañez wanted to include, it should have been a duology. It was a story with a lot of potential that didn’t quite come together for me.